CFN – Generally speaking, I do not enjoy reading authors others have recommended: A character or set of characters in a recurring series that a friend or acquaintance has fallen in love with tend to drive me to distraction. In this, I prefer to try and discard said author at the book store or library.
That being said, I am happy to state that I have fallen equally in love with Eve Dallas and Roarke in J.D. Robb’s “…in Death” series as my friend has. The plots are generally predictable, but the word play in this futuristic set of romantic-suspense books have captivated me.
The stories revolve around Eve Dallas, found abused and abandoned in Dallas with no memory of her previous life in Dallas at the age of 8. She becomes a cop and lives in New York City in 2058. Her equally damaged boyfriend, known only as Roarke, immigrated from Ireland and has more money than God, Bill Gates and Warren Buffet combined. Roarke, however, is slightly more advanced along the evolutionary line as he remembers and appreciates his humble beginnings.
The two meet on a case, and let the games begin.
J.D. Robb, nom-de-plume for Nora Roberts, bangs out a novel about once every six weeks or so under one name or another. She writes in series and lets the characters evolve nicely. A check of her website (www.noraroberts.com) notes that she has been published since 1981 with the Silhouette line of books (romance books for those not in the know) and is a New York Times best selling author.
You don’t live 31 years in the publishing industry without giving the public what it wants.
The “… in Death” series follows Dallas as she solves various series of bizarre and seemingly unrelated murders with compassion and dedication to the job that seems slightly overwrought. But as we see Dallas develop as a character, we come to understand her devotion to the victims of these crimes and why it is that she works herself into exhaustion for them. Roberts has done an excellent job with character development in the “… in Death” series and it makes for a wonderful read. The sex scenes are realistic, the stories compelling and Roberts’ vision of a future world could, very possibly, come true.
To date, there are 35 novels and a novella or two in the series. I plan to read each of them, if only to see where the relationship between Dallas and other various characters go. At an average of about 325 pages per book, this is a pleasant afternoon or weekend read. I do recommend reading the books in order as the characters evolve significantly from book to book, and frequent references are made to cases in previous books. Reading out of sequence will distract the reader from the case at hand.
My rating: 3.5 out of 5 stars.
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Dael Foster is an avid reader and a self employed accountant in her spare time. By her count she’s read over 12,000 novels (some of those many, many times), several hundred text books and more government websites than ought to exist researching tax and business issues for her clients. She works between Montreal and Ottawa, with detours to Cornwall for family and clients.
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